Big Brother is Watching (And He’s Got Opinions on Your Molecular Structure)

 Big Brother is Watching (And He’s Got Opinions on Your Molecular Structure)

Now, if you thought battling group stops was your only challenge, buckle up, buttercup, because you're never truly alone in that van. Oh no. You’ve got more eyes on you than a Vegas casino pit boss. We used to have this app called Mentor, a digital nag that judged your every turn. It’s gone now, probably off to "mentor" some other unsuspecting workforce into submission. But don't you worry, its spirit lives on, reincarnated and arguably worse, in the form of Geotab and the all-seeing, all-knowing, all-too-often-mistaken "Eye in the Sky" in our glorious Electric Delivery Vans (EDVs).

Geotab: The Silent Snitch

Geotab is like that quiet kid in class who sees everything and then writes a detailed report to the teacher. It's always there, silently logging your speed, your braking, your acceleration, whether you remembered to bow down to the shrine of Jeff Bezos before starting your route (okay, maybe not that last one... yet). It doesn’t beep or buzz much, it just... knows. And then, BAM! Your dispatcher gets a little love note saying you "harshly accelerated" while trying to merge onto a highway where Granny in her '87 Buick is doing 90, or you "braked too hard" avoiding a rogue tumbleweed that had a death wish. You start driving like you’re chauffeuring a Ming vase filled with nitroglycerin, all to appease the silent digital overlord.

The EDV "Eye in the Sky": Hyper-Sensitive and Hallucinating

But the real star of the surveillance show these days is the camera system inside the EDVs. I swear these things have become sentient, and frankly, a little bit paranoid. They’re marketed as safety features, and sure, in theory, they are. In practice? They’re like a hyper-sensitive, easily startled robot that throws false violations around like confetti at a particularly depressing parade.

• "Distraction!" it screams, because you dared to scratch your nose.

• "Seatbelt Off!" it shrieks, even though your seatbelt is so tight it’s practically become a part of your DNA, all because you leaned slightly to grab a package.

• "Following too close!" it wails, when the car in front of you slammed on its brakes to admire a particularly fluffy cloud, and you had the audacity to also not crash into them.

I’m convinced these cameras are now picking up on cosmic rays or rogue squirrels three counties over and blaming us. You could be sitting perfectly still, meditating on the Tao of package delivery, and it’ll flag you for "unauthorized interpretive dance." You sneeze? That's probably a "handheld device" violation because, for a split second, your hand was near your face. Adjusted your sunglasses? "Distraction, level critical! Alert the elders!"

The appeals process for these false flags is a whole other adventure, like trying to explain quantum physics to a goldfish. "No, Mr. Algorithm, I wasn't using my phone. I was swatting a bee that had declared my ear canal its new summer home."

CDF: The Customer is Always Right (Even When They're Breathtakingly Wrong)

And then, of course, there's the classic: CDF – Customer Delivery Feedback. The Amazonian version of a Yelp review, but with the power to directly impact your standing. This is where the true poetry of the human condition shines through.

Sometimes it’s lovely, a beacon of hope: "Driver was so friendly and hid my package perfectly from the porch pirates! Five stars, would have this hero deliver my firstborn!" Those are the ones you screenshot and send to your mom.

Then there are the others. The ones that make you question literacy, common sense, and the future of civilization.

"Driver left package AT THE DOOR. I wanted it ON THE MAT. The mat is LITERALLY three inches to the left of the door. ONE STAR."

"Package was wet. It was raining. Driver should control weather. TWO STARS."

"My dog barked at the driver. Driver is clearly anti-dog. ZERO STARS." (Never mind that your Cujo-sized land shark was trying to take a chunk out of my leg).

You learn to develop a skin thicker than a van tire, or at least a really good, sarcastic internal monologue that you definitely don't say out loud......

Mostly.